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Amazon Games reading to join AAA market with ‘Tomb Raider,’ ‘Lord of the Rings’ and more

Draugoth

Gold Member
divisao-de-jogos-da-amazon-esta-se-preparando-para-demitir-180-funcionarios-099707.jpg

Six years after joining Amazon Games as vice president in 2018, Christoph Hartmann , the co-founder of video game publisher 2K, is finally ready to talk about what’s been going on behind closed doors, as the company approaches the September release of its free-to-play MMORPG “Throne and Liberty” and the October launch of the action RPG “New World: Aeternum,” both of which will be available on PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X and S consoles.

What can you tell me about when we’ll hear more on the new “Tomb Raider” and “The Lord of the Rings” games, and when those titles will be released?

It’s not going to be tomorrow, but it’s not too far away. As I said, we’re getting into a much more regular cadence of shipping games. That’s all I’m allowed to tell you right now… It’s all about quality. You don’t want to just be rushed out. That’s doesn’t work. It has to be Triple-A quality, because the bar is so high.

via Variety
 

Švejk

Member
I'd rather they just do nothing with the IPs. Both already on the verge of being overly tainted. Just Remake/Remaster the old entries and call it a day.

Thinking about it now, I would tip drill the shit out of a full-on Remake of the EA LOTR action slashers; Two Towers and ROTK in UE5. Got damn.
 

Fbh

Member
I really feel like a proper, somewhat grounded AAA Lord of The Rings game made in the visual style of the Peter Jackson movies could be an "easy" smash hit.
But I'm sure they'll find a way to fuck it up. It's either going to be Fortnite-ified, or full of Marvel writing, or some boring MMO for modern audiences made in the style of Rings of Power
 

Lunarorbit

Member
Yeah they should really chill on the tomb raider ip for a bit. No one is excited for it. The series was rebooted a few years ago and each subsequent release had fewer sales: ~15 million, then 12, and finally 9 million.

Those are good sales numbers..... until you see they spent $135-160 million on the last game.

I don't trust any of these mega companies jumping in to video game production.
 
I get feeling they got into the big budget licensed games market at the absolute worst time possible, and Amazon (like other big tech) will cut their losses quickly if they don't have any hits on their hands. I'm not writing them off yet, just measured expectations.

Now what I'd REALLY like is another LotR: The Third Age, which was a super underrated FFX clone. It was way better than it should have been, up there with the hack-n-slash LotR games.
 

MrRibeye

Member
Check out the lore on Legolas and Gimli:

zmXM4f.jpg


"After Aragorn's death, Legolas made a ship in Ithilien and left Middle-earth to go over the sea. His strong friendship with Gimli promoted Legolas to invite him to accompany him to the Undying Lands, making him the first and only Dwarf to do so. He was never seen again in Middle-earth."

^this is so siiick

Imagine co-op dude bro action as a 3rd-person game in the style of God of War, but you play as Legolas and Gimli and enjoy their hilarious banter as they travel to Helm's Deep -> Glittering Caves -> Fangorn Forest -> Ithilien -> Undying Lands.
 

Danny Dudekisser

I paid good money for this Dynex!
Speaking from first-hand experience, Amazon philosophically does not and will never understand games. They don't know what makes them fun, what makes them successful, or how to plan long-term. Look at their track record over the last decade. There is zero chance of them doing anything positive with these IPs.
 

leizzra

Member
Well, few years ago they could have had a game from 3rd party studio. Just in line with Rings of Power. They decided that they’ll do it themselves. It’s half of 2024 and they still have no game.

Maybe it’s for the better. Their series is awful and the license that they posses makes many problems for proper game in Tolkien universe.
 

Bernardougf

Gold Member
Anyone asking amazon for a new good Lotr game really should take a look what they are doing with their tv series.... I wish they just stay the fuck away from anything LOTR related

Anyone expecting to play something classic and good as their favorite hero are in for a rude awakening....
 
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Mr.Phoenix

Member
I'd rather they just do nothing with the IPs. Both already on the verge of being overly tainted. Just Remake/Remaster the old entries and call it a day.

Thinking about it now, I would tip drill the shit out of a full-on Remake of the EA LOTR action slashers; Two Towers and ROTK in UE5. Got damn.
NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO and NO.

What's wrong with gamers these days? And this shit permeates into even the developers too. Rather than actually buckle down and make great good games, we ask for remakes and remasters. Because we are more comfortable playing old shit than something entirely new. And the devs unfortunately feed into this shit. Eg... rather than Konami making an actual New MGS game, or hell even rebooting the series or something, they are pouring in tons of resources into remaking Snake Eater.

There is so much they can do with both of those IPs, if they do it right. And I don't know about you and others, but I would rather see something new or different, even on those IPs, than see yet another remake or remaster. And if we cant trust devs to do that, then they shouldn't be in this business to begin with.

Fuck man.... gamers are really as unimaginative as the devs.
 

Dazraell

Gold Member
Thinking about it now, I would tip drill the shit out of a full-on Remake of the EA LOTR action slashers; Two Towers and ROTK in UE5. Got damn.
If I understood the legal hoops correctly, WB owns all of the rights to all of the visual aspects of the LotR and Hobbit movies. So while other companies can acquire a licence to do a game based on this IP, they can't use fragments from the movie nor any visuals that came from it like designs of the setpieces or likenesses of the actors who played certain characters. So if remake of these games would happen, they would either need to make everything "visually distinct" or negotiate a licence not only from Embracer (for LotR brand), but also from WB (for visuals). Best what we can get is probably a PS Classics re-release, which I assume may also be problematic as rights are split between Embracer, WB and EA
 

StereoVsn

Member
In theory a proper RPG based on LoTR would be an easy slam dunk. In practice Amazon is going to shit all over it with “modern writing for modern audiences” and the game will inevitably crash and burn.

And the less that can be said of Amazon’s prospects with Tomb Raider, the better.
 
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tommib

Gold Member
Can’t even imagine the amount of atrocities that will be done to Tomb Raider. It’s going to be a bloodbath of generic bloat.
 
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Švejk

Member
NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO and NO.

What's wrong with gamers these days? And this shit permeates into even the developers too. Rather than actually buckle down and make great good games, we ask for remakes and remasters. Because we are more comfortable playing old shit than something entirely new. And the devs unfortunately feed into this shit. Eg... rather than Konami making an actual New MGS game, or hell even rebooting the series or something, they are pouring in tons of resources into remaking Snake Eater.

There is so much they can do with both of those IPs, if they do it right. And I don't know about you and others, but I would rather see something new or different, even on those IPs, than see yet another remake or remaster. And if we cant trust devs to do that, then they shouldn't be in this business to begin with.

Fuck man.... gamers are really as unimaginative as the devs.
It's really hard, almost impossible, to have faith in these giant corpos making decisions on these well crafted and thoughtful, classic IPs.

Look how they handled all these comic book movie games the past decade. Absolutely abysmal. (Not that I care about comic books and their spandex laden shit anyhow)

Overall, it's better they try and make a new IP, instead of ruining what is masterclass, even further.

I would love for an original LOTR take from Silmarillion lore, but do you see what the shitty Rings of Power is doing? Shoehorning shit in there that shouldn't be? If you don't, then you're part off the problem.
 

Švejk

Member
If I understood the legal hoops correctly, WB owns all of the rights to all of the visual aspects of the LotR and Hobbit movies. So while other companies can acquire a licence to do a game based on this IP, they can't use fragments from the movie nor any visuals that came from it like designs of the setpieces or likenesses of the actors who played certain characters. So if remake of these games would happen, they would either need to make everything "visually distinct" or negotiate a licence not only from Embracer (for LotR brand), but also from WB (for visuals). Best what we can get is probably a PS Classics re-release, which I assume may also be problematic as rights are split between Embracer, WB and EA
Ugh.. Probably right... Same legal hoops GoldenEye struggled to get through.
 

Danny Dudekisser

I paid good money for this Dynex!
If I understood the legal hoops correctly, WB owns all of the rights to all of the visual aspects of the LotR and Hobbit movies. So while other companies can acquire a licence to do a game based on this IP, they can't use fragments from the movie nor any visuals that came from it like designs of the setpieces or likenesses of the actors who played certain characters. So if remake of these games would happen, they would either need to make everything "visually distinct" or negotiate a licence not only from Embracer (for LotR brand), but also from WB (for visuals). Best what we can get is probably a PS Classics re-release, which I assume may also be problematic as rights are split between Embracer, WB and EA

Tolkein's estate is super protective of the IP in general. I've talked to several developers either making or who were looking to make a game based on LOTR, and there's a ton of limitations on what anyone can do with the license. That's why Daedalic ended up making a game focused entirely on Gollum that had no real relation to what people actually care about in LOTR.
 

Schnauzer

Member
Does anyone believe Blue Protocol is still happening? All the time they spent censoring the game to make it less appealing...
 
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Tomi

Member
Meh, i dont believe they will make great games
We can only see microtransaction nightmare...
 
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